life
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abuelita aka the Notorious ABU (she doesn’t like it when I call her that) invited her friend Spiridoula K from Queens (aka tía SK) over for dinner last night. tía SK brought delicious homemade Greek pastries and an album of black and white photographs from when she was a little girl. I call her tía…
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one of the new people in group is Angelique, who went to a music and performing arts high school on the upper west side where a lot of the kids are on drugs I’ve heard. she used to drink but then she began using opioids because she says it’s not as easy to track missing…
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listen to moon words on SoundCloud moon words oh my God/kill me now/only we would lay on the New York City trains/sun and The Kills/it’s a good afternoon/like it shines on me/how strange it is to be/anything at all/let me hold it close and/keep it here with me/because kissing you/with good beats on/feels like me…
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this morning I woke up early enough to trace a rectangular patch of sun on the wall opposite to my bed. it was a long, beautiful patch, grapefruit pink sun. it’s one of my favorite things — to trace the sun, and how it paints the East River. many days I feel held together with…
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if you’re ever in nyc, look down. hiding between sidewalk cracks and under train tracks, you might find one of the people who inhabit joe’s cool, miniature world. joe is joe iurato, a street and commercial artist, and he’s amazing. he has painted on large, outdoor walls for a long time. he also makes small,…
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I feel like a punk. most teachers, Catholic School nuns, cops, and passersby on the street would say I am one. that’s the attitude that I identify with. one thing about the names people give to us, they can be a kind of injury. a punk: the rotting piece of wood used as kindling to…
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in group we tell each other you can’t recover if you don’t know what you’re recovering from. I don’t know exactly what I am recovering from. hurt, maybe? hurt is almost always telling me a truth. all this week I was thinking about the times I stood on the toilet seat holding the stall door…
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I think people see me differently than I see myself. it’s like I see myself as a giant fuck up, but now and then, here and there, I don’t know, I get the feeling that I matter. I feel this way when I’m playing and singing in group or some hole in the wall, even…
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against all real evidence things have feelings, too. they don’t love in the human way, still: my thrift shop sweater, faded red and out at the elbows, has a story. I try to imagine the places it has been and who wore it before it was mine. the torn-up Adidas are retired now but they still trash-talk to me from the…
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when I was little, this straight-laced little kid, I sang in church all the time. the choir loft at St. Veronica’s seemed very near the sky. singing enveloped me. there was no sense of performance or judgment. no pressure. I just sang. I was aware of religion. I can’t say I understood much about practicing…
cookie nieves 